Shingles Vaccine OK in Mild Lupus

March 25, 2014

Vaccination against shingles may be safe for patients with mild, stable systemic lupus erythematosus, according to a small pilot study conducted at the Oklahoma Medical Research Foundation in Oklahoma City. "Patients with lupus have a dramatically increased risk of shingles even in their 20s and 30s, so that a 30-year-old woman with the disease has a risk of zoster that's about equivalent to a 60- or 65-year-old person with a healthy immune system," said the researcher Eliza F. Chakravarty, MD.

There ere are no data on whether the shingles vaccine is safe for patients with autoimmune diseases. MedPage Today reporter Nancy Walsh writes, "Potential concerns have been whether the vaccine would result in exacerbations of lupus or more-difficult-to-manage disease, and if the vaccine itself could result in disease in these immunocompromised patients."